Chapter 120 : Chapter 120
Chapter 120: The Alarm “Broke”
Bang!
Lu Zheng blinked, watching the door slam shut behind him. His expression was somewhat confused.
He couldn’t quite figure out what he had done to upset Yi Ning again.
She had driven him out in such a hurry that she didn’t even let him finish saying goodbye.
There shouldn’t have been anything offensive in his wording when he apologized, right?
And Yi Ning had accepted his apology in the end too, hadn’t she?
Lu Zheng scratched his head, then sighed helplessly.
Forget it.
If he couldn’t figure it out, he’d just stop thinking about it.
A woman’s heart was as unpredictable as the ocean floor.
That was a truth Lu Zheng had come to understand well in daily life.
He opened the car door, sat in the driver’s seat, and headed toward the Hero Association.
His mission was complete—it was time to report to Miss Qiu Yu.
At the same time, Lu Zheng had no plans to continue his vacation today.
Heroes could have holidays, but most evil organizations didn’t take time off.
Even if Miss Qiu Yu had shown kindness by giving him a day off today, he still had to be there when Yi Ning executed her evil plans.
Rather than going home and having to rush out again when Yi Ning started working, Lu Zheng preferred to just wait at the Hero Association.
If anything unexpected happened, he could respond immediately.
Ever since the incident with Ye Qin, he felt uneasy letting her go on missions alone.
The drive back to the Hero Association was smooth.
D-City was already a laid-back and remote city. Except during rush hour, traffic jams were rare.
And now, in the blazing summer heat, even the sidewalks were nearly empty of pedestrians.
“I’m back.”
After parking the car, Lu Zheng returned to the office with his helmet, greeting Miss Qiu Yu and Ye Qin, who were both buried in paperwork.
“Welcome ba—”
Hearing his voice, Miss Qiu Yu instinctively replied without lifting her head. Then she suddenly looked up, her eyes filled with surprise as she looked at Lu Zheng.
“I thought I gave you the day off today?”
“I finished everything I needed to do. And since I’ll need to deal with Yi Ning this afternoon anyway, I figured I’d come back and see if there was anything you needed help with.”
Miss Qiu Yu looked even more surprised. “Usually you’re always dreaming about taking time off during work. And now that I actually gave you a day off, you’re back looking for work?”
“You didn’t accidentally hit your head or someth—Ow!”
Before she could finish her jab, she felt a sharp elbow to her side, and instinctively shut her mouth, turning to look at Ye Qin’s helpless expression beside her.
“Ah… ah…”
Realizing her mistake, Miss Qiu Yu covered her head with both hands and collapsed onto her desk, letting out a mournful groan.
No discipline↓
Ye Qin sighed.
What could she do? This idiot was her best friend.
“After all, Brother Lu Zheng, you usually act like a total slacker~ But Qiu Yu’s really happy you came back to help, right?”
She gently nudged Miss Qiu Yu’s shoulder with her elbow, subtly tugged at her sleeve under the table, and kept signaling her with her eyes.
Now’s your chance.
Give Lu Zheng some positive reinforcement!
Unfortunately, Miss Qiu Yu was a stubborn mule—one that not only ran slow but refused to follow direction.
“Of course I’m happy! A workhorse volunteering to do labor for me—what’s not to love!”
Ye Qin facepalmed.
She couldn’t even understand how those words made it out of her mouth.
Forget it.
I’m done.
I’m letting go.
If this loser starts crying like a beaten dog later, don’t come clinging to my leg—tears soaking through pantyhose is not a pleasant feeling.
Lu Zheng, however, didn’t take the minor jab to heart.
In fact, he was used to it.
He’d grown up hearing Miss Qiu Yu mock him constantly and had long mastered the art of mentally filtering out unwanted noise.
Lu Zheng set down his helmet and walked over to the fridge, grabbing a can of soda.
Pssht
He popped the tab and took a few big gulps.
“Ah!”
Lu Zheng let out a satisfied exhale and wiped his mouth with the back of his hand.
In the scorching heat of summer, only ice-cold soda could bring him relief.
He returned to his seat with the drink and asked about the Rigil case.
Unfortunately, there was little new information.
Aside from finding more bombs of the same model on him and in his room, nothing could definitively link him to Ye Qin’s incident.
That guy was also completely uncooperative in interrogation—not saying a single word.
Miss Qiu Yu was already considering whether to apply for assistance from a specialist hero in this area.
“Well then.”
Lu Zheng took the documents Ye Qin handed him and shook his head regretfully.
He didn’t have any perfect solution either.
He could try rolling dice to randomly draw a power, but if it turned out to be some extremely abstract ability, he’d be stuck like that until Rigil confessed.
And he still had to deal with Yi Ning’s daily dose of evil every day. He worried that his abstract ability combined with Yi Ning’s abstract plans might turn the whole of D-City into one giant abstraction.
Maybe later he could ask Yi Ning if she could take it easy or open a backdoor for him.
As Lu Zheng thought, he flipped open the file in front of him.
It was a report on dealing with black markets that sold dangerous items.
Miss Qiu Yu really had gone all out.
She’d roused the person in charge in the middle of the night.
First, she launched a thorough investigation into all personnel overseeing the black markets, then had Ye Qin lead a team to arrest several suspects one by one, successfully capturing a few who were secretly colluding with black market dealers.
That very night, they even raided the black market and caught several major leaders. The rest, the small fry who escaped, were being closely tracked. They’d likely be caught soon too.
However, the aggressive approach had stirred quite a bit of resentment among the staff there, so they’d need to smooth things over soon.
The three people in the office worked in silence.
Besides the rustle of turning pages and the hum of the air conditioner, no other sounds could be heard.
When fully immersed in something, it was easy to lose track of time.
Lu Zheng agreed completely with that notion.
Before he knew it, it was almost time for Yi Ning’s daily evil plan.
Everyone paused their work and looked toward the clock on the wall, silently awaiting the blaring of the alarm.
Three seconds.
Two seconds.
One second.
But even as the second hand ticked past Yi Ning’s usual evil hour, no alarm sounded.
“Is this thing broken?”
Lu Zheng stared at the projection displaying the city map. He waved his hand over it, then tapped the top of the machine suspiciously.
TVs got fixed with a slap or two—maybe this machine would too.
He was sure Yi Ning was working today.
And Yi Ning never missed her scheduled evil activities, so clearly, the machine must be broken.
Miss Qiu Yu and Ye Qin both nodded in agreement with Lu Zheng’s assessment.
Miss Qiu Yu even told him to go ahead and handle Yi Ning as usual, while she contacted the Hero Association to send someone to repair it ASAP.
This was the equipment responsible for monitoring all of D-City. If something bad happened while it was down, that would be no joke.